Minuets by John Williams
by Bar Sira
Summary: What a difference one word can make…
1. Robes, Fewest, Droids, Rogues

**Author's note:** As my regular readers know, I have made it a hobby of late to take passages I find on Harry Potter stories that have one crucial word misspelled or misused, and then write stories in which these malapropisms are taken literally. Now, we all know that such passages are not confined to the Harry Potter subcategory; hence, the present collection of Miraculous tales. As in the original "Minuets", the attributions may or may not be verifiable when you read this, since the authors in question may choose to correct their syntax, change their pen names, and/or delete their stories; still, you have my word that these passages have all really appeared in this subcategory.

A word about technique. Obviously, none of these vignettes actually reflect the intentions of the authors quoted, and in many cases the whole context of the passage has been radically altered. However, I have made it an ironclad rule that any pronoun will refer to the same person or thing in the Minuet as in the original story, and any direct quote will be attributed to the same character. (And of course this applies to OCs and historical figures as well as to canon characters.)

 **Disclaimer:** _Star Wars_ belongs to George Lucas; the stories quoted belong to the authors named; the cover image is by Filippo Baratti; various other allusions to works and persons not my own abound. (And, of course, the title shouldn't be taken to imply that John Williams is in any way responsible for the content of this fic.) The stories themselves, however, are strictly my own work.

 **Other _Minuets_ collections:** If you enjoy these tales, you may also wish to look into "Minuets in Aeolian Mode" (Percy Jackson and the Olympians), "Minuets Assemble!" (Avengers [Movies]), "Minuets by Brain Matter" (NCIS), "Minuets by Guitar Villain" (Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir), and "Minuets with Bombadil" (Lord of the Rings) – and, of course, the Harry Potter series that started it all, "Minuets in B Minor". All are currently available on my profile.

* * *

 _"It was a man, with Jedi Ropes and he had Luke's eyes. It was Anakin Skywalker."_ –DecryptWriter, "Leia's Second Chance"

"Howdy, li'l missy," he said, tilting back his glowing blue Stetson jauntily. "So you're my boy's new apprentice, hey? Good to see him gettin' out of the funk he's been in since Little Ben went desperado.* Once you've got yourself trained in the ways of the Force, maybe the two of us can go out and wrangle some of these here First Order mavericks with our trusty Jedi Lassos. Here's yours, catch."

Rey caught the luminous rope in a sort of daze, and turned to stare in bewilderment at Master Luke. The latter chuckled. "It's all right, Rey," he said. "My father's just been a bit eccentric since he visited this one remote system on the edge of the Galaxy. Texas, they call it."

* * *

 _"This way gets the least of my troops killed."_ –Prince Pondincherry, "The SI Awakens"

"I see," said Hux. "Well, that's an imperfection in the plan, of course…"

"Not to me," said Phasma. "The least of my troops is FN-2187, and I hate the sniveling little worm. We'll be all the stronger for losing a weakling like him."

Hux considered this. "But, if he dies, there will still be a least among your troops," he pointed out. "Won't there?"

Phasma shrugged. "I suppose so."

"And then you'll grow to hate him just as much," said Hux, "and approve a plan to get _him_ killed. At which point, someone else will become the least of your troops – and so it will go, until you end up with just one stormtrooper left in your whole brigade. He, of course, will be both the greatest _and_ the least of your troops, so you'll half hate him and half love him; probably you'll approve a plan to get him half killed – down to the waist, maybe…"

"Hux?" said Phasma.

"Yes, Phas?"

Phasma raised her blaster. "Shut. Up."

* * *

 _"'Look out,' his master, Obi-Wan Kenobi, said into his comm unit. 'Four druids, inbound.'"_ –Stellarsong, "The Limit"†

Anakin glanced up toward the western margin of the sacred plain; sure enough, there came a quartet of Gaulish sages, stroking their beards and murmuring to each other as they approached the circle of standing stones. " _Four_ of them," he remarked, impressed. "They must be pretty worried about this upcoming battle, then. That's rather gratifying, anyway, isn't it, Master?"

"I daresay," Obi-Wan replied tartly. "But I doubt it will much gratify Ahsoka while she's being burned alive inside a wickerwork effigy to appease the immortal gods. So why don't you get busy rescuing her?"

Anakin rolled his eyes, but duly ignited his lightsaber; then, as Obi-Wan's X-wing began strafing the edge of the plain, he rushed out from behind the menhir to the stone altar where his Padawan lay bound. "Easy, Snips," he whispered as he slashed at her bonds. "We'll have you out of here before those four druids know what hit them."

* * *

 _"'Arrest of traitors, sir,' the captain said immediately. 'Dangerous rouges.'"_ –Glory Alchemist, "Saber"

"Are you so gullible?" Governor Tarkin snapped, snatching the confiscated makeup containers out of the men's hands. " _These_ rouges aren't dangerous. Look!" He flipped up one of the lids, and began swabbing the contents onto his cheeks. "Tum-te-tum-tum… you see, nothing wrong with me… hmm-hmm-hmm… never better… da-da-da-da… I feel pretty, oh so… aawwk! Aaagghh! Eee-eee-eeeuuurrrgghhh…"

As the two men impassively watched their superior's cheeks melt off his face, the captain turned to his sergeant and remarked, "Do you ever just despair of our commanders, sometimes?"

* * *

*In case anyone's wondering: yes, this was written before _The Last Jedi_ came out.

†Crossover with Animorphs.


	2. Emanated, Crude, Wing, Statues

_"The weapon made a soft humming noise and a small blue light laminated from it."_ –JediKnight59, "Second Chance"

"There you are, Master Kenobi," said the Hooloovoo craftsman, extending the lacquered frame to Obi-Wan with an air of placid satisfaction. "I won't say that your weapon was the easiest model to work from – the controls were surprisingly intricate, and its glare was far more disorienting than my own generally is – but I think I acquitted myself rather well."

Obi-Wan took the frame in his hands, and stared in awe at the exquisite laminated portrait of his lightsaber sitting alight in a sconce. "Astonishing," he said. "I should never have imagined, until today, that a super-intelligent shade of the color blue could even exist, let alone manipulate matter well enough to create masterpieces of lacquer-work. It would seem to defy reason – yet here the evidence is before me, so I suppose my ideas of reason have been too limited hitherto."

The small blue light gleamed happily. "A fine response, Master Jedi," it said. "You're taking your first step into a larger world."

* * *

 _"E CHU TA = meaning is not defined but it is a cruse word in Huttese"_ –DepressingGreenie, author's note to "Friendly Fire"

"Your Excellency," said the young Jabba the Hutt, "I present you with the sacred chrism."

As Bishop Worla took the cruse of perfumed oil and began to intone the ritual blessing, Jabba saw the lettering along the side of the small glass vial glint in the candlelight, and wondered once again what exactly _e-chu-ta_ meant. It was Old Huttese, he knew that much; it wasn't Greek, or Latin, or Zargosian, or any of the other traditional ecclesial languages – so why was it always engraved on the cruses in which the sacramental oils were kept?

He grunted inwardly. Someday, when he had time to spare, he really would have to apply himself to the study of Church history and teaching. Of course, that couldn't be any time soon – with his uncle quietly grooming him to take over the Family's business, he didn't have much time to spare for such impracticalities these days – but someday… yes, someday.

* * *

 _"He gently picked up his beloved niece and carried her to his X-ring."_ –Going to enjoy this, "The Fate of the Force Was upon Him"

It was nearly three hours before Rey Solo awoke from her almost deathlike trance. She let out a faint groan, and attempted to lift herself up on her elbow; before she could move, though, she felt a hand on her shoulder, and a familiar Force touch impinged upon her senses. "No," said her uncle. "Not yet, Rey. Save your strength; you're lucky to be in one piece."

"Uncle Luke?" Rey murmured. "What happened?"

"You went suddenly catatonic in the middle of your meditations," said Luke. "The Emperor must have tried to possess you again – really meaning it, this time. If I hadn't managed to get you to the X-ring in time, I hate to think what might have happened."

Rey managed to lift her eyes a few inches, and saw that she was, indeed, lying within the makeshift circle of wooden X's that her uncle had made when the Force ghost of Darth Sidious had first attacked her. She smiled dreamily. "Good old X-ring," she said. "Funny how silly it seemed at first; when you said that surrounding me with little crosses would protect me from the Dark Side's assaults, I thought you'd lost your marbles."

She heard Luke chuckle. "I know," he said. "I thought the same thing about Master Yoda when he suggested it to me. But it looks like he was right, after all; whatever that 'ancient victory of good' was that he talked about, its emblem does seem to still be potent after all these centuries."

He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. "I'll go let Han know you're awake now," he said. "Stay strong, little queen, and may the Force be with you."

* * *

 _"He would make a nice piece of decoration for my home. I love statutes."_ –scottivan, "Interview with a Sith 3 – Lady Githany"

"Well, I'm glad to hear that, ma'am," said the alien merchant. "You've no idea how hard it is to sell a life-size effigy of Darth Bane holding a scroll displaying the Three Statutes of Aargau. If you'll take it off my hands even for thirty credits, you'll be doing me a favor."

"Twenty," said Lady Githany.

"Twenty-eight."

"Twenty-three."

"Twenty-six and a half."

"Done."


	3. Hangar, Caution, Cockpit, The Matter

_"Darth Vader walked toward his personal hanger quickly."_ –Scififan33, "The Force Is Strong with This One"

Commander Mahmee Dirast eased the closet door open with all possible care, and saw his prize gleaming, crimson and desirable, on the pole. With a grin, he reached up and lifted it off the hook; then he shut the door again, turned to leave the room – and practically fainted at the site of the black-clad figure standing behind him.

"Fancy meeting you here, Commander," said Darth Vader silkily. "The Force informed me that the notorious Closet Raider had dropped into my quarters, so naturally I hurried over to greet him properly. I had no idea it was going to be you."

"Lord Vader," Dirast gasped, "please, it isn't what it seems. I was only trying to protect your… I mean… there's a light on one side of it that won't… Lord Vader, please, if you'll just let meeeuuurrghh…"

As the suffocated body fell to the ground, Vader reached down and extracted his property from its stiffening fingers. "That won't be necessary, Commander," he said, and casually kicked the body to one side; then he opened the closet with a wave of his hand, and restored his personal cape hanger to its rightful place.

* * *

 _"This story contains mention of slavery so read with cation"_ –4gardiean, author's note to "The Discovery of Anakin Skywalker"

"'Now there arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph,'" the primal midichlorian Hava read aloud to its millions of Bright-Edge offspring. "'And he said to his people, "Behold, the people of the children of Israel are numerous, and stronger than we. Come, let us wisely oppress them, lest they multiply, and it come to pass that, when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies, and, having overcome us, depart out of the land."

"'Therefore he set over them taskmasters to afflict them with burdens, and they built for Pharaoh cities of tabernacles, Phithom and Ramesses. But the more they oppressed them, the more they were multiplied and increased. And the Egyptians hated the children of Israel, and afflicted them and mocked them; and they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in clay, and brick, and in all manner of service in the field…'"

Amid the crowds of the listening Lords of the Force, one particularly sensitive midichlorian shuddered, and snuggled up closer to the sodium ion that it had smuggled into the assembly. When it had to listen to stories that contained mention of slavery, it always liked to have a free cation somewhere nearby; it helped it to remember that, however horrid such stories made life seem, there were still _some_ things about the universe that were positive.

* * *

 _"'Alright, Rex, time to get the hell outta here!' [h]e called to the cot-pit."_ –CyanGalaxy, "Force Sensitive"

"What about the cots?" Rex shouted back.

"No time," said Anakin. "We'll have to leave them."

"What?" Rex was scandalized. "We can't leave the cots! These are what the younglings of the Jedi Order have slept in for a millennium; we can't just leave them to be destroyed!"

"If we stick around and try to save them, _we'll_ be destroyed!" Anakin shot back, thrusting his thumb toward the nova-ready sun. "It'll be fine, all right? When we get to Scintillant and rebuild the Temple, we'll dig a new pit and throw some sleeping bags in it or something."

Rex looked dubious. "The ancient Jedi sleeping-bag-pit," he said. "Doesn't quite have the same ring to it, does it?"

" _Get moving!_ "

* * *

 _"I was hoping that maybe you could…[u]m…deal with matter."_ –RobertoAG, "Eva Squad"

The Force ghost of Silvia Orden spread her insubstantial hands. "Well," she said, "you can see for yourself that I can't."

"No," Rosh Juall agreed. "No, clearly not. Um… when did this happen, may I ask?"

"Oh, a couple days ago," said Orden. "Some creep with a red lightsaber barged into my chamber while I slept, and… well, never mind, the details aren't pleasant. Anyway, the point is that, whatever dealings with matter you require, you're going to have to consult someone else from now on.

"Unless you should ever need something hit with lightning, of course," she added, as Juall was taking his leave. "In that case, just give me a holler."


End file.
